


All The Things We've Never Said

by gonnafeelgood



Category: Everwood
Genre: Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-08-20
Updated: 2004-08-20
Packaged: 2017-10-05 16:29:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,156
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43667
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gonnafeelgood/pseuds/gonnafeelgood
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bright's wondered if he's really gay, or just a little gay, like just for Ephram. After all, Emphram is a little ... pretty. And it isn't like Bright doesn't still want to go down on Genna, 'cause he TOTALLY does. And he still has fantasies about Laynie, sometimes, as fucked up as that is.</p>
            </blockquote>





	All The Things We've Never Said

Madison walks down a long hallway, turning a now-familiar corner past the ID checker who just waves her in. Smiling slightly and nodding, she heads directly for the pulsing lights and rhythm ahead of her. Feeling a shiver of relief tap dancing down her spine, she speeds up, just trying to get in there. To be anonymous. To forget, just a little bit.

Madison runs her hands down her side as she starts to sway with the beat, starting slow, working her way into it. She's been coming to Compound every weekend since she got into Denver – there's no cover and lots of dancing, even if the floor is crowded on the weekend.

She doesn't need a lot of room. She doesn't need a lot of anything. She doesn't need ...

She feels the ghost of breath on her lips and the feel of an elegant hand in hers, deceptively strong.

She brushes her hand over her stomach, still flat. It's not going to look any different now.

Shaking her head, she dances harder.

She doesn't need anybody.

This is the only place she manages to believe it.

*-*

Bright steels himself in his truck before he gets out.

'I can do this,' he gives himself a little pep talk, putting on a Resolve Face that he hasn't had to pull out since he was arguing with Amy about talking to Ephram.

Egh. Amy and Ephram. Amy and Emprham and their parent-approved tryst in New York City. Where they are probably humping like bunnies or something.

Bright grimaces. He does NOT need to think about that right now. He doesn't need to play caring older brother or concerned best friend or jealous ...

'Stop,' he commands his brain, recognizing that it was funny in a not-funny way that the ONE time his brain wouldn't turn off was with this thought pattern.

"Whatever," he says out loud. "I'm going in. I'm here. I'm here to have fun. Screw the rest of that crap."

Setting his shoulders back and taking a breath, Bright checks his wallet one more time, to insure that the ID bearing the name 'Jason Silvers' was the only ID he is carrying. He may be stupid enough to be going to his first gay bar by himself and to have that "first" spawned out of the realization that he's totally lusting after his sister's boyfriend ('Again,' his traitorous brain reminds him) …

But he's not stupid enough to get CAUGHT doing it.

He doesn't need them, anyway.

He doesn't.

*-*

After Bright manages to keep his cool with the bouncer and the ID checker, he figures he's earned himself a beer. Several beers, probably.

Looking around, he notices a group of older men in leather vests eying him and nudging each other.

Yes. Several beers, for sure.

Bright looks down at his outfit, wondering now if he had chosen the right clothes. He had been trying not to be too gay, because ... well, he wouldn't want anyone to get the wrong impression. But he hadn't wanted to be too not-gay, because ...

He actually prefers to just leave that line of thought alone, as well. It can go hang out with the "why am I jealous of my sister when I see her give Emphram those damn LOOKS" line of thought. They could form a support group or something, the Bright Abbott Has Abandoned Me group.

His thoughts are interrupted when he feels a hand on his arm. "Yeah? What? I wasn't ..."

The bartender who's hand is on Bright's elbow raises an eyebrow. "You want a drink?"

"Yes," Bright says empathically. The bartender raises the other eyebrow.

Perhaps a little TOO emphatically.

The bartender nods and removes his hand. "First time?" he asked, his face actually looking a little … sympathetic?

Bright didn't want sympathy.

"No," he says, desperately looking for a voice that just says 'relaxed.' He's pretty sure that it mostly came out a little breathy, but he'd take that over desperate any day. "No, just the first time here."

The bartender smiles, still with that look in his eye. "Sure. So, what are you looking for?"

Bright searches his mind (now blank, of course, when it was totally NOT helpful) for something to order. "Ummm ... beer. Yes. A beer."

After a few more awkward pauses and some suggestions from the bartender, Bright gratefully walks away from the bar with a beer in his hand.

He hadn't known how fucking BAD he was at being gay.

Turning away from the bar, he sees a flash of a face that he feels like he should recognize. Wasn't that … Carl Feeney?

Bright raises an eyebrow of his own as he cranes his neck to watch the figure going into the dance floor.

*-*

Madison's been dancing for what feels like hours. She hardly sees faces while she's dancing – half the time her eyes are closed and, when they're not, they're not focused. She's focusing on what she feels, not what she sees. She's feeling the beat thrum through her entire body, numbing her a little better and a lot safer than the liquid numbing that everyone else in this place is consuming.

She doesn't drink, anymore. Not really. She's found that the bottle is no broken-hearted girl's best friend. Nothing makes the melancholy flow out of her like a couple of shots of Jack Daniel's.

She's tried everything. Every escape mechanism that anyone had ever tried. And none of them worked. Most made things worse.

Except this. Dancing in a gay bar until she collapses. Using her body, shutting down her mind, loving the music. It works every time.

They leave her alone here. She's pretty sure that the bartenders wonder at the tall, young blonde girl who just showed up one weekend and keeps on coming back, only buying bottled water and dancing for hours. She's never introduced herself to anyone. She never speaks here.

She just dances.

*-*

Bright stands in the entry to the dance floor, his hand loosely clasping his bottle of beer.

So. Carl's gay.

Bright watches Carl slide a hand down one man's back ... Bright leans in and turns his head a little ... Yep, THAT would be his ass.

So. Carl's REALLY gay.

Bright's wondered if he's really gay, or just a little gay, like just for Ephram. After all, Emphram is a little ... pretty. And it isn't like Bright doesn't still want to go down on Genna, 'cause he TOTALLY does. And he still has fantasies about Laynie, sometimes, as fucked up as that is.

A soft groan escapes from his mouth as he watches Carl suck on the neck of Guy he's dancing with, while Guy slips a hand over Carl's crotch.

Ok ... question answered. Not just gay for Emphram. Apparently, also gay for Really Gay Carl and Some Guy.

As his eyes follow the two men who are practically having sex on the dance floor, his eyes snag on a familiar profile. Blonde hair, eyes open, staring straight ahead in Bright's direction.

Fuck. So much for not thinking about Emphram.

*-*

Madison feels a hand tug on her arm. She focuses her eyes, a little shocked that someone has tried to get her attention here. That's been the reason she keeps coming back – nobody breaks the spell.

Her eyes focus on one of the last faces she had any desire to see.

As her face registers shock at finding Bright, touching HER, in THIS place, a small part of her brain thanks everything that is holy that at least it's not Emphram.

So much for forgetting.

*-*

Bright half-drags Madison to a table in a poorly-lit corner, furious for a reason that he can't even imagine. He knows it's illogical to be angry at her – it's not like she followed him here or something.

Unless she did.

Besides, she fucked over one of his best friends. His best friend.

His best friend who he had dreams about making out with.

MAKING OUT WITH! God, this gay thing was turning him into a girl.

He sits down across the table from her, noticing for the first time that she looks a little shell-shocked and a lot … empty. Bright had never liked the girl, but she had always had fire.

"What's going on with you?" he blurts. Sitting back, he blinks. Well THAT wasn't what he thought he was going to say.

Madison looks up, her eyes looking a little blurred and her face looking closed. "I ... why are you here, Bright?"

He fidgets. "Why? It's a free country. People can go to bars ... gay ones ... in Denver ... gay bars in Denver without getting the third degree."

Her head drops a little and, for the first time, he sees a bit of fire in her eyes. "Not HERE in the bar, Bright. I don't care. Why are you here, making me sit with you?" Looking up, it becomes clearer in her eyes.

She wants to know what he want from her.

His stomach drops a little and he thinks he's made a mistake. "Look ... I was just surprised to see you. You took off so quickly and Ephram didn't even know where you went. And, yeah, I know that you weren't together or anything, but you KNEW that he was in love with you and you just left and you threw it away and you threw HIM away and ..."

He trailed off.

Fuck. THAT was a bit of an overshare.

Her eyes sparkle with something. Maybe tears, maybe amusement, maybe with pain. Maybe a little of all three.

"You want him," she says firmly, sounding the most like the Madison he's known since they started talking. As he starts sputtering, trying to deny it, to say that he didn't LOVE Emphram, just that he's pretty sure that Emphram made him a little or a lot gay and that he wonders how he's doing and he worries ...

He feels a hand on his thigh. Madison has leaned over, her face closer to his than it ever has been before. He can see, now, that she has a freckle on her right eyelid and a small chip in her front tooth. He can see the imperfections that he hadn't seen before, when she was just Emphram's Perfect Girlfriend.

He can see how lonely she is.

"He's hard to love, you know," she says, almost conversationally, as her hand rubs small circles on his thigh. "He'll give so much that you don't feel like you have enough to return. He hardly realizes how deep in he is, because he's just a KID in so many ways and he doesn't know that most people don't have feelings that deep."

Her hand continues rubbing, getting closer and closer to the seam of his jeans and producing a similar response as Really Gay Carl and the Guy had.

"He mopes around all the time and he has this idea of love being either like a Molly Ringwald movie or like some Shakespearian tragedy. He's never been in a relationship, any kind, even a friendship where he hasn't felt either totally superior or totally inferior. He has no middle ground. He has no compromise."

Her hand starts rubbing with intent, pressing so hard that he only became increasingly aware of the cloth between her hand and his cock and painfully aware of the seam of his jeans. He gasps a little, not sure what is going on, but somehow unable to stop either her hand or her words.

"He's not perfect, but you know that. He still pours too much milk on his cereal. He likes to kiss with his eyes open. He browses for books on sexual technique in bookstores in Everwood and, even though he's blushing the entire time, he refuses to put his head down or try to hide it. He's not great in bed yet, but he will be."

Her hand presses harder, stroking up and down Bright's jeans, pulling a little at the end of each stroke. He sight is starting to spot up and his breaths were coming quicker and quicker. He isn't going to last long.

"He's very eager to learn. He's still a little embarrassed about sex, but he wants to know everything. He'll ask questions until you just want him to shut up and go to sleep already. He gasps at the beginning of sex and hisses at the end."

Images fly in Bright's head - Emphram gasping in his ear, eagerly unbuttoning Bright's shirt, laying in bed afterward and talking and talking and talking …

"I think he wants you, too."

Bright shudders and gasps, overwhelmed with sensation and thought and realization.

He leans back, pulling in breaths just to stay conscious. Madison's eyes get sad again, but they're no longer blurry. She stands up, brushing one hand across Bright's cheek as he sucks in gulps of air.

"Tell him, Bright," she says, turning away from him. "And don't lose him. Because it just might kill you."

**Author's Note:**

> This was written for the [Everwood, Summer 2004 Challenge](http://www.basketofcliche.org/ewny/summer2004). I'm writing this for [](http://thepurpleswitch.livejournal.com/profile)[**thepurpleswitch**](http://thepurpleswitch.livejournal.com/), who requested two of these three things:  
> 1\. Magilla!fic, preferably with a little bit of pre-pairing Magilla/Delia  
> 2\. Madison/Bright, "an ill-advised [handjob] in the middle of the night"  
> 3\. Carl/the boyfriend, their first summer together (no sap!)  
> I managed 2 and 3.


End file.
